“The scene of such a catastrophe has not the slightest interest for me,” answered Bessie. “I will take your word that the half-crown is lost, and I will give you another in its place, or at least two shillings and sixpence, which comes to much the same thing. You go, or have gone, to school, I suppose?” “Yes, Miss.” “Then you know what a moral means?” “I think so, Miss.” “Well, the moral of this afternoon’s work is: For the future, when your mother sends you out for flour, don’t stop to gather roses by the way, for it is extremely unlikely that you will a second time meet any one in these fields worth half-a-crown.” Having finished which speech, Bessie, toying with her dainty parasol, still stood looking at the girl, for whom she felt that compassion, which always moved her when she saw anything of the feminine gender unkempt, forlorn, untidy, unhopeful, uglier than she had “a right to be.” To her, an ill-dressed girl or woman was precisely what a daub is to an artist, a series of discords to a musician. She loved prettiness. Let a woman’s dress be of cotton or of velvet, she still loved to see that dress worn with a certain consciousness; and the terrible want of self-assertion, the utter abandonment of all self-appreciation in the girl who now stood opposite to her, was so distressing to Bessie, that she entreated of her as a parting favour to wash her face, and push her hair out of her eyes before she proceeded to the mill. “There is plenty of water in the stream,” Bessie added; “and do make use of it freely, for at present you look as if you had been buried without a coffin.” A week after, the young lady, who had forgotten all about this occurrence, was told that a girl wanted to speak to her—a girl from North Kemms—Priscilla Dobbin by name. “She does not want another half-crown, I hope,” laughed Bessie, when she heard the name; and she went out into the hall, looking, as she always did, pretty enough to drive any man to distraction. “Well, Priscilla, you have not lost your money again, have you?” thus Bessie commenced the conversation. “No, Miss—I found it. I could not rest; and so, the first afternoon mother could spare me, I had a good look, and I took one of my little brothers, and he got it in among a lot of weeds growing in the ditch; and here it is back again, please, Miss—and—my duty to you,” finished Prissy, who evidently considered the last four words an appropriate ending to her sentence. Bessie took the half-crown, and held it in the palm of her hand for a moment, doubtfully.